Color me surprised: The Atlanta Braves have decided to renege on their draconian policy to disallow outside food from hallowed ScumTrust Great White Flight Park
I actually am surprised by this. Usually when a baseball team does something that can easily be perceived as unpopular by the fans, they usually inevitably double-down on their decision and address the media with an as-of-matter-of-fact tone that declares that the unpopular decision is what’s best for the long-term, and that ultimately baseball is a business and choices like these are made that are best for business.
I would’ve expected that the Braves would have listened to the initial outcry of unhappy fans, weathered the storm, and then had a stuffy press release that dictated that they understand that people are unhappy with the decision to ban outside food, but that proceeds from concessions and the take from all adjacent The Battery businesses would inevitably be the coffers in which the team could use on free agents, despite the fact that the Braves are amongst the cheapest teams in the world and rarely ever are willing to overpay for a free agent unless it’s something completely haphazard like Dan Uggla or B.J. Upton.
No, they actually, and quickly, reneged on the initial decision to ban outside food, and suddenly come back and allow it. The skeptic in me thinks this is done as a temporary fix to the fact that almost none of the businesses in The Battery are remotely close to finished, and that they have no intention of being finished by the first official regulation homestead in mid-April, and that the risk of having fans even more pissed by the sheer lack of accessible food, causes potential backlash to the public reputation of ScumTrust Park as a whole.
But also, the fact that the team was so quick to reverse their decision leads me to believe that somewhere along the lines of, oh, 100% of fans seemed to agree that changing a policy that was in effect for the 17 ancient years of Turner Field’s operation, was not good, and they were vocal about expressing their disagreement of it.
Either way, this whole epic and fast charade of the arrival of ScumTrust Park isn’t just egg on the face of the Braves, it’s an actual defeat to the organization, versus the scummy fans that are the bane of their existence. And any time any fans manage to actually defeat the team, is a good day in my book. Sports organizations have far too much leverage and power, and it’s nice to see an occasional win for the hands that actually feed them.
